


One Little Problem

by TurtleTotem



Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Ableism, Age Regression/De-Aging, Brother-Sister Relationships, Charles in a Wheelchair, Erik is a Sweetheart, F/M, Gen, M/M, Mr. Tumnus - Freeform, Post-Cuba, Triggers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-08
Updated: 2013-12-08
Packaged: 2018-01-03 23:41:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 6,756
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1074427
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TurtleTotem/pseuds/TurtleTotem
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's been months without a word since his sister and... whatever Erik was to him left Charles paralyzed on a beach. That doesn't mean he's going to let Erik rot in a CIA cell. He figures they'll find him, rescue him, and watch him walk away all over again.</p><p>But when they find Erik, there's one unexpected hitch. He's four years old.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [TheAssbenderWhisperer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheAssbenderWhisperer/gifts).



In the eight and a half months since Cuba, Charles had not heard a single word from Erik or Raven. He supposed they were very busy, doing... whatever it was they planned to do. It was probably just as well that Charles knew nothing about it. And he had more than enough on his plate already – a school to run (now with two students), X-Men to train, physical therapy to sweat and swear and hate the world through, and a new flavor of tea ordered from a catalog that should be arriving any day now. The fact that the two people dearest to him in the world would not be dropping by to sample it was neither here nor there. Even if he couldn't help thinking Erik really would like Darjeeling if he would only try it. This way he didn't have to share.

Under those circumstances, the last thing he expected was to settle at the kitchen table with a cup of chamomile before bed, and find a pair of familiar golden eyes gleaming at him out of the shadows.

"Hello, Raven," he said after a long moment. "It's wonderful to see you. Is… that really necessary?" He waved a hand at the helmet framing Raven's features – red and purple now, good heavens, who had thought that was a good idea?

Raven stepped forward and pulled off the helmet, setting it on the table with a clink. "I was afraid you might not let me in if you felt me coming."

"That's ridiculous, Raven. Of course I'd let you in." Both their gazes on each other were uncertain, shy – his on her bare blue scales, hers on his wheelchair. She didn't seem shocked by it, only uncomfortable; they knew, then. Charles had hoped, had told himself that they wouldn't stay away if they knew – so much for that. He tried to stamp out the little flare of resentment and hurt. Metaphorically stamp, of course. "Are you... staying long?"

Raven bit her lip. "I didn't come for a visit, Charles. I came to ask for help."

"Of course. Anything." A reckless promise, that, but it didn't matter; her next words would have ensured his assistance even if it had been actively unwanted.

"They've taken Erik."

***

'They' turned out to be a rogue element of the CIA, and oh Erik was never going to let him forget that, never mind that none of the people they'd trusted were involved, and never mind that Erik had in some measure brought it on himself. Apparently the Brotherhood (as they were styling themselves) had broken into a CIA facility to gather intel on rumored 'mutation cure' attempts, and Erik had been captured.

For the very few dangerous missions the X-Men had run since Cuba, Charles had been confined to the Blackbird or even left behind at the mansion; his uselessness in a physical fight was a stark fact now. For this, though, he insisted on coming along. His boys weren't ready to face the CIA on their own – Hank looked especially daunted by the prospect – and he didn't trust Erik (or, more painfully, Raven) not to go on some sort of killing spree on their way out.

It turned out, however, that getting into the facility was easier than Charles had dared dream; security wasn't nearly what he would have expected from a place intended to hold Erik Lehnsherr. Raven shapeshifted to get them through one checkpoint, Charles put a few people to sleep at another; Hank jiggered an alarm, and they were in.

"He's this way," Charles said, pushing his chair swiftly down the long corridor. "I can feel his mind but something is... not right, I think perhaps he's drugged..." They arrived at the proper door, and before he could ask Hank to examine the lock, Alex shouldered past and kicked it in. Charles suppressed a sigh; _non-violent solutions, Alex..._

Never mind, they were in, and Erik was – where was Erik? The room's only occupant was a tear-streaked little boy, curled up on a pallet on the floor...

The boy bolted upright at their entrance, grey-green eyes wide, and threw himself into Charles's lap, shouting in – German, Charles realized. He tuned his telepathy, trying to get a sense of what the words meant.

_"I knew you would come!"_ the boy was saying, and _"What did they do to me, Charles?"_

***

"Judging from the files Raven saw and the evidence from my examination," Hank said, adjusting the glasses on his broad muzzle, "it appears that this was an attempt to turn back the clock on the subject's DNA, to a time before the expression of its X-gene. Obviously it had a more... severe effect than anticipated."

"Obviously." Charles tapped his fingers nervously on the arm of his wheelchair, watching the other side of Hank's lab, where Raven was holding little Erik on her hip and helping him count test tubes. 

"I would put him at about four years of age," Hank continued. "He seems perfectly healthy, at least."

"Yes, quite the rosy-cheeked little moppet." Charles had to laugh; Erik had always been a man of sharp angles and straight lines, hawk-like and forbidding; now he was quite shockingly adorable. "Is it permanent?"

Hank spread his hands helplessly. "Too soon to say."

Charles caught Raven's eye and gestured her over. The moment she set Erik down, he climbed into Charles's lap and put a hand on either side of his face, looking solemnly into his eyes.

"Erm," Charles said, "yes?"

"Charles," Erik said. "I missed you." He flopped down against Charles's chest with a heavy sigh, suddenly boneless.

Charles swallowed against wholly unexpected tears, wrapping his arms around the warm weight in his lap. "I missed you, too, Erik. You, ah... you remember me, then? How much do you remember from before... the room we found you in?"

"I 'member lots," Erik said, frowning. "But it's all..." He made inarticulate gestures with his hands, radiating frustration. "I remember but I don't _understand."_ He looked up at Raven. "Are you my girlfriend?"

Charles felt himself go rigid; Raven's cheeks darkened.

"Um... you're too young for a girlfriend," she said.

Surprisingly, he accepted this, nodding and burrowing further into Charles's shirtfront. "I remember you, too, Hank," he said. "You had brown hair, but now you have fur." He giggled – _giggled, Erik giggling_ – and reached out to stroke Hank's shoulder. "It's soft."

Charles's mind was still snagged on the idea of Raven being Erik's girlfriend. Not that Raven wasn't old enough to make her own romantic decisions, of course. And not that he had any right to dictate where Erik could bestow his affections. Unfortunately.

Well, whatever might or might not have existed between himself and Erik before was irrelevant. Little Erik seemed to have no memory or understanding of it, and that was certainly for the best right now.

"He has to stay here," Raven said, gnawing on a fingernail. "He can't possibly go back to the Brotherhood like this."

"Certainly not!" Charles found his hold on Erik tightening, as if Raven were trying to take him away.

"But I need to tell them _something_ … that he's injured, I guess, and recuperating here?" She reached out to stroke the sleepy child's cheek. "Somehow I'd rather Emma Frost didn't know about this."

"Ugh, Emma," Erik grumbled. _"Alte Hexe."_

_Old witch._ Charles choked on a snort. "Yes, of course he'll stay here. After all, we already have two little students. One more can't be that much trouble."


	2. Chapter 2

Charles woke to the blare of the smoke alarm.

Erik had gone to bed without protest the night before, asking only to have his old room back -- the one two doors down from Charles. His questing mind now found that room empty, and swept the house in some alarm before finding Erik and Raven in the kitchen.

_Charles!_ Raven cried on feeling his mind brush by. _Come control this little monster!_

_Is something on fire?_

_Not anymore._ He caught the muffled edge of a thought – _set this_ kid _on fire if he doesn't cut it out—_

On that reassuring note, Charles hurried – insomuch as he could hurry, anymore – to get himself into bathrobe, wheelchair, and elevator, thence to the kitchen. Along the way, he touched his temple and soothed those woken by the smoke alarm back into peaceful slumber. It was a bit early for anybody to be up anyway, and it sounded like the last thing the situation needed was more confusion.

In the kitchen, Raven was sporting her own bathrobe and fluffy slippers, thanks, Charles was sure, to the mansion's drafty halls rather than any concern for modesty. They were the same ones she had left behind months ago; it was almost surreal to see her here again, just as she had been. Bacon sizzled in a skillet on the stove, mingling its mouthwatering scent with that of the cinnamon scones in the oven. A lovely domestic scene. Except for the edge of scorched acridity in the air, the charred dishtowel in the sink, and the sight of Erik on top of the refrigerator, clutching a bottle of beer in one hand and a carton of eggs in the other.

"Erik, get down from there _right now!"_ Raven shouted.

"No! You're not my mama, I don't have to do what you say!" He fumbled an egg out of the carton and held it aloft, ready to throw.

"Erik, don't you _dare—"_

"Erik, really." 

Erik blinked at Charles's mild, almost bored tone, his grip on the egg relaxing. "Hi, Charles."

"Good morning," Charles said dryly. "May I ask what you expect to accomplish by throwing eggs at poor Raven?"

His little face crumpled, and he hugged the bottle of beer to his chest. "She won't let me have a drink. _I need a drink."_

Charles had to fight very hard to keep laughter from bubbling out of his mouth. "Don't we all," he muttered into his hand. "Erik, darling, the body you're in now is very small. Alcohol would be very bad for it. It would make you sick."

"But I need a drink," Erik wailed. "Everything is stupid and hard and I'm not supposed to be so little."

"I know, I know," Charles said as soothingly as he could manage. "I quite agree. But making you sick isn't going to help. How about if you came down here and had some tea with me?" Erik had always sneered at his tea, he remembered belatedly, but to his surprise the thought seemed to interest him now.

"Okay," he said after a moment's deep thought. "I can have some tea with you."

Raven carefully retrieved the eggs and beer, and soon Charles was sitting across the little kitchen table from Erik, each of them with a steaming cup of the new Darjeeling.

"Slowly now, it's hot," Charles advised. Erik obeyed, taking a careful sip, then licking his lips. "You like it?"

"Uh-huh." Erik took another sip, smiling as if surprised. "I like it a lot."

"Good." _Told you so_ hovered on the tip of his tongue; this Erik might not have any memory of their ongoing argument about the merits of tea. The thought made him suddenly, achingly sad.

Erik was rubbing the spot on his arm where blood had been drawn. "Are we going to see Hank again today?" he asked, quite as if he'd rather not.

"No," Charles assured him, "today you're going to come to class with me and meet the other children going to school here. Won't that be fun?"

Erik frowned deeply and glared into his teacup. "Yeah. Fun."

***

The fledgling school had two students now – Alex's brother Scott, age 8, and a little telepath named Jean, age 7. Ordinarily, Charles supposed, Erik would have been too young to make them a decent playmate, but after months of just the two of them, they were ready to give any new child a chance.

Which was more than he could say for Erik.

"So an animal, you see, can move itself around, while a plant stays where you – Erik, stop that. A plant stays where you put it. Though they are capable of motion in their way – you can see that this one has tilted toward the – Erik, put that down! Toward the sunlight, and – _Erik!"_

Erik scowled down at his shoes as Charles approached and snatched away the straw he'd been using to blow spitballs at Scott's head.

"I know what a plant is," Erik grumbled. "I'm not a baby."

"Yes, you're certainly showing me how mature you are." Charles crumpled the straw and tossed it toward the wastebasket. "Being older than you look ought to make it _easier_ to behave yourself, don't you think?"

Erik grumbled and put his head down on the desk.

For a few minutes he was quiet, and Charles was able to almost finish the lesson before he noticed Erik was now squinting one eye shut and holding his fingers up, pretending to pinch Scott's head between them. 

In the split second it took Charles to decide whether to ignore that, Scott perceived his shift in attention, turned around to look at Erik, and leaped over the desk at him with a strangled cry of rage.

 

"He started it!" Erik said hotly, the moment Charles released control of his body, in the corridor outside the classroom. (A chair-bound teacher, he reasoned, had only so many options when it came to breaking up fights – though running them both over had its appeal.)

"Yes, he hit you first, and believe me he will not get off easy, but you have done nothing but provoke the boy from the moment you laid eyes on him! What is your grudge against poor Scott?"

Erik gave him a sneering, eyebrow-shrugging sort of look, as if to say, _Have you met Scott? Do I need a reason?_

"Scott is a perfectly nice – Erik?" The little boy's eyes had suddenly widened to golfballs, staring over Charles's shoulder.

"Hey there, Erik! I heard about your situation, man. Tough breaks."

"D-Darwin?" Erik stared up into Darwin's grinning face like he'd just broken every law of reality.

"Oh! I'd forgotten you wouldn't know," Charles said. "A few months after you and I… parted ways, Erik, Darwin was able to pull himself together – literally – and contact my mind."

Erik, still staring, stammered in German.

"No, he's not a ghost," Charles assured him.

"Solid as a house," Darwin agreed, holding out a hand. Erik hesitantly touched it, gripped it, shook it – and threw himself into Darwin's arms.

"I'm so happy you're alive!"

"Me too, man," Darwin said with a surprised laugh. "Me, too."

"Erik," Charles said with dawning calculation, "would you like to go keep Darwin company for a bit? Considering the time of day, I believe he's on his way to join Sean and Alex for training. Yes?"

"Yes I am! Come hang out with the _fun_ people, Erik." Darwin lifted Erik onto his shoulders and walked off with a wink at Charles, Erik chattering excitedly about mutations and survival and evolution all the way down the corridor, a thirty-five-year-old's vocabulary flowing with the strength of a four-year-old's enthusiasm.

As Charles finished his lesson – and delivered his ringing scold of Scott, now holding ice to a split lip – he kept a telepathic toe finger on the pulse of what was happening outside with Erik and the boys. There was uncertainty and confusion at first, as they all adjusted to Erik being… what he was now, but things did not truly become unpleasant until they made the joint discovery that Erik could not access his mutation.

"Well, you weren't moving metal yet the first time you were four years old, were you?" Darwin pointed out with his signature easy calm.

"No," Erik admitted, fighting back tears.

"There you go, then. It'll come. In the meantime, we all need to train in hand-to-hand."

When Charles finally released Scott and Jean from lessons and came onto the lawn, he found Erik, Darwin, Alex, and Sean chasing each other around the lawn, roaring and lumbering like bears. He watched for several minutes without drawing their attention, a wistful smile tugging at his mouth. It had been longer than he wanted to admit since he'd seen the boys that happy and carefree, and Erik?

He had never seen Erik smile so much in his life.

***

"Contacting the Brotherhood is sort of... complicated," Raven told them, "and it'll take some time, especially for a situation this delicate. I'll be back tomorrow, maybe the day after."

Erik sniffled and frowned, and insisted on a hug goodbye, but then returned to playing with Hank and Alex. Charles thought he'd taken Raven's departure in stride. Until bedtime.

Before opening the school Charles had done a great deal of research into child psychology, both the conventional reading of books and articles and the more direct route via telepathy. He knew that small children's tantrums were most often triggered by frustration, by the overwhelming experience of thoughts and emotions beyond their ability to communicate. On reflection it seemed inevitable that Erik, with decades of adult emotion and memory floating about in his childish brain, would cave under the pressure of that frustration.

It was one thing to understand this intellectually, and another to deal with the fact of a four-year-old boy kicking and screaming and crying on the floor, his face contorted and red, his bone-shattering shrieks echoing through the hallways of the mansion.

Scott and Jean hovered in the doorway to Erik's room, eyes wide.

"Is he gonna die?" Scott asked, in a tone of neutral curiosity.

"Certainly not," _unless I kill him._ "Both of you go on back to your rooms."

"Should I go get help?" Jean rubbed at her temples, bottom lip wobbling; Charles took a moment to help her shore up her shields against Erik's waves of distress.

"Just go on to bed, my dears. I can handle this." _I hope._

"WANT RAVEN," Erik screamed as the door closed behind Scott and Jean, "I WANT RAVEN," and proceeded to reiterate the sentiment in German, Yiddish, French, and Portuguese.

Charles had already tried offering distractions and bribes, even tried a stern order to desist, with no result. Now he simply sat with his face in his hands, waiting it out. _I can be patient, I can be—_

A particularly harpy-like screech ripped up his spine, and without entirely meaning to, Charles simply cut off Erik's access to his vocal cords.

The sudden silence was just as jarring as the screams; for a horrible moment Charles wondered if he'd killed the child. But no, Erik was still breathing; he patted at his open, silent mouth for a moment, bewildered, then sat up and glared at Charles.

"We're done screaming," Charles said calmly. "You may lay on the floor and kick as long as you like, but other people are trying to sleep. The screaming is over."

Erik glared a little more, but gave it up after a minute when it did him no good, flopping back the floor with the kind of heartfelt melodrama that only small children could manage. Cautiously, Charles gave him back his vocal cords.

"Erik, it's time for bed," he said very gently. "I can tell you're very tired. I'm sure you would feel better if you got some sleep."

"But I need Raven." Erik's voice didn't _quite_ achieve a wail, but it was a desperate, watery sound nonetheless.

"Why do you need Raven?"

"I always sleep with Raven."

Charles tried not to choke on that little tidbit of information. "Well. I'm very sorry, darling, but she's simply not here. She had to go tell your other friends that you're safe now. You wouldn't want them to worry."

Erik snorted, a peculiarly adult expression on his little face. "Emma wouldn't worry. She'll take over if I'm gone too long."

"I see." Charles didn't know whether to laugh or be alarmed. "Well, then, you should rest up, shouldn't you? Need to stay on your toes around Emma Frost."

To his surprise, this worked like a charm; Erik scowled, but immediately crawled up from the floor into his bed, flopped against the pillows and closed his eyes.

***

Getting ready for bed was an arduous process for Charles these days; it was over an hour after Erik went to sleep before Charles was comfortably propped amongst his pillows, lights dimmed for a few minutes of relaxing reading before lying down.

Then he caught the glimmer of an approaching mind just before his bedroom door creaked open.

"Yes, Erik?" Charles fought to keep impatience and dread out of his voice.

"I forgot to say my prayers," Erik mumbled, rubbing teary eyes.

"That's all right, you can say them now."

"I don't remember how." A horrified whisper, and in the little boy's eyes Charles saw, once again, the face of the Erik he'd known – wrenchingly vulnerable but more hauntedly ashamed than a real four-year-old would know how to feel. It was on the tip of Charles's tongue to offer his telepathy, try to recover the memory, but who knew what effect that could have? His immature brain had muted its decades of memory for a reason. Dragging things out by force could trigger a psychotic break, catatonia...

"Well then," he said instead, gentle and aching, "why don't you climb up here with me, and I'll read you a story?"

Erik considered this carefully, then nodded and, with a great deal of kicking and fluffing and squirming about, joined Charles under the covers, tucking his little body under Charles's arm. "What story are we going to read?"

Charles eyed the book in his hand – a history of chess and related games, rather above Erik's current reading level – and set it aside, fumbling for what else his bedside table might hold.

"Ah! C.S. Lewis, what do you think?"

Erik ran little fingers over the title, sounding it out. "The Lion, the Witch, and the..."

"Wardrobe."

"War Drobe. Oh! Mr. Tumnus! I remember this book!" He settled happily against Charles's side. "Yes, read Mr. Tumnus."

Charles flipped through the book, looking for the first scene with Mr. Tumnus. "I didn't realize you were familiar with this book. You do know it's a Christian allegory?"

"It has lions and children and centaurs and defeating evil." Erik gave him a mulish look. "And _Mr. Tumnus."_

Charles chuckled, still flipping pagses. "I admit, I've always had a soft spot for Mr. Tumnus myself."

"He's nice. Like you." Erik burrowed deeper into Charles's side.

"I... didn't think 'nice' was very high on your list of valued traits."

"He's Lucy's friend. He protects her from the Queen. He keeps her safe."

"He tries, anyway," Charles murmured. "She ends up having to rescue _him_ in the end. But I suppose that's what friends are for."

_"Ja._ Friends look after each other and don't hurt each other." His voice went very, very small. "Except sometimes by accident." Before Charles could think of responding to this, he reached out and nudged the book. "Read! Read Mr. Tumnus."

Charles read, and by the time Lucy Pevensie dozed off by Mr. Tumnus's fire, Erik was fast asleep at his side. Charles turned off the lamp and joined him.


	3. Chapter 3

They gave lessons another try the next day, the children taking their reading assignments outside to lie on blankets in the summer sun. Charles, a copy of _The Once and Future King_ in his lap, found himself nodding in his chair; sweet Jean began giving him amusement-flavored mental pokes to keep him awake.

After one such poke, Charles looked up to realize Erik had left his spot on the blanket and was standing at the terrace balustrade, peering between the columns at the satellite dish. A brush against his mind confirmed Charles's suspicion; Erik's thoughts were centered on his distressing inability to touch metal.

"Do you remember moving that dish?" Charles said softly, wheeling away from the others.

Erik nodded. "You helped me."

"I did." And it had been one of most gloriously, terrifyingly intimate experiences of his life, and the moment he knew beyond all doubt that he loved Erik. He caught himself rubbing his chest, as if the heart-pain were literal. "I could try to help you again. I don't know if it'll work, since your powers hadn't manifested at this age, but we can try it."

Erik looked almost painfully hopeful. "Yeah! Yeah, let's try it."

Now committed, Charles realized, too late, that he had no idea how to help this Erik. His mutation was powered by intense emotion, and they had previously achieved control by balancing the purely negative emotions Erik had depended on with positive ones. This child might have all of Erik's memories lurking under the surface, but his mind was not the endless roil of torment his adult self's had been, and the last thing Charles wanted to do was lose that.

For a very long few minutes Charles regarded Erik – his hopeful eyes, his bright childish mind – and tried to think of a way to get intense emotion from him without damaging him the way Shaw had.

Finally he took a coin from his pocket and set it on the balustrade.

"If you can move that coin," he said, "then you, and I, and Raven, will go get ice cream as soon as she gets back."

The coin shot into the sky and out of sight.

 

Erik spent most of the afternoon competing with Jean in coin-moving contests, which doubtless was as good for her fledgling telekinesis as it was for Erik's social skills. Scott leaked jealousy everywhere, like puddles of acid, until Charles found a way to include him in the fun – sacrificing his pocket change to be blasted by optic plasma at regular intervals. Precious little of any academic worth took place, but Charles had never intended his curriculum to be bound by textbooks anyway. All in all, a much better day.

Especially when Erik brought him a rock he'd found in the grass and pressed it into his hand, saying excitedly, "Look! Look!"

"Oh, that's lovely," Charles said politely. The rock held flecks and streaks of something metallic, doubtless the source of Erik's enthusiasm.

Erik made an exasperated noise. "Look at it _my_ way," he said, and held Charles's hand to his sun-warm little temple.

For a stunned, disbelieving moment was Charles unable to comply. Erik had always been wrenchingly inconsistent with his attitude toward Charles's telepathy, welcoming it with a shrug one moment, guarding violently against it the next. Charles had never, never expected to be _asked_ to come into Erik's mind. To use Erik's _power,_ no less.

Erik was waiting impatiently. Charles swallowed, and dipped into the boy's perceptions.

Experiencing the the rock the way Erik did was certainly fascinating; metal was very nearly a part of him, and he perceived its structure and magnetic field in a way Charles knew he would never be able to articulate. But even more wonderful to Charles was the way Erik's mind lit up with confidence, strength, and simple joy, all of it pushed eagerly toward Charles for them to share.

"Isn't it beautiful?" Erik whispered.

"It is," Charles whispered back. "It's beautiful."

***

Raven returned the next morning, grim-faced but unwilling to say anything beyond that she'd successfully told the Brotherhood that Erik was recovering from injury and she was going to stay with him.

"Stay? How long?" Charles tried to keep the pitiful hope out of his voice.

"I don't know," she said with a heavy sigh, watching Erik stir a truly disgusting amount of chocolate syrup into his milk. "Until we know something, I guess."

"Well, in the meantime, you'll be pleased to know you have plans for the afternoon." He grinned at her raised eyebrows. "Do you still like butter pecan ice cream?"

 

"One butter pecan, one pistachio, and one hot fudge brownie sundae deluxe!"

Raven collected their orders and brought them to the umbrella-shaded table outside the ice cream parlor, where Charles and Erik were knotting dandelions into a chain.

"Great, now your hands are dirty," Raven said.

"Well, you can eat your ice cream with your hands if you want," Erik drawled, "but I'm gonna use a spoon. Wait, Charles!" He took the dandelion chain from Charles's hands as he tried to set it aside, and tied the ends together so that it made a circle. Then he stood up on the bench and settled the flower crown onto Charles's head. "There."

Charles opened and closed his mouth a couple times, exchanging a baffled smile with Raven, then shrugged and tucked into his pistachio ice cream.

An old woman smiled at them, tottering by on the arm of a strapping grandson. She was thinking loudly about how nice it was to see such a lovely young family out spending time together. The idea startled Charles more than it should have. Of course, a man and woman and child out together, people would assume they were a family. And they were, weren't they? Not in quite the configuration it seemed, but – still family. Right?

"It's so good to have you here, Raven," Charles murmured, "for however long. You know you're welcome to stay always. You both are." He ruffled Erik's hair, though Erik, up to his elbows in hot fudge, didn't seem to notice.

Raven sighed, her false human face settling into lines of sadness, regret, discomfort – guilt? "Oh, Charles. And you try so hard to be a good brother to me. Sometimes you screw it up royally – but then, sometimes I don't deserve the effort. Maybe it evens out." She bit her lip and reached hesitantly for his hand; he granted it immediately. "Charles, I'm so sorry we left you there. I swear, we had no idea that – that you were hurt so badly. We thought Moira would take care of everything… I thought she would take care of you!" Anger flashed in her eyes.

Charles squeezed her hand. "There wasn't much she could do about spinal damage, love. You didn't know. _I_ didn't know, not until I tried to move – and I told you to go. I don't blame you for leaving." It was a lie, but one he _wanted_ to be true; maybe that was close enough.

Erik, he realized, was listeningly intently, frozen mid-bite, but making no attempt to join in the conversation.

"I can't go back into the box you built me," Raven said. "I know you meant to protect me, but I was dying in there."

Charles grimaced. "I've… come to understand that a bit more, since… Well, I know what it's like, now, to have limitations you'd give anything to remove." He gestured at his legs. "To be – well, crippled. Imprisoned. If that's how you felt, then… then you had to go." He ached to ask her more, ask what the Brotherhood was doing, what Erik intended to do with his fierce, moldable hawk-fledgling of a sister. But even without Erik sitting at his elbow, he couldn't ask that.

They finished their ice cream in silence, but still hand in hand.

 

Raven had gone to get the car, and Erik back into the parlor to wash the chocolate off his hands. So Charles was alone when the trio of thugs, high on youth and bravado, decided a cripple in a flower crown was too good a target to pass up.

Charles could have sent them on their way with a bit of a memory smudge, maybe even a boosted conscience for good measure, but after all, he was going to face this situation many times in the coming years. He might as well learn to handle it philosophically. _Who knows, perhaps I can turn this into a learning experience for all of us._

Then, once they'd dumped him out of his wheelchair, and he lay bleeding at the bottom of the three shallow steps to the sidewalk, his head was spinning too much for him to get a grasp on his telepathy.

_"You leave him alone!"_

Charles almost didn't recognize Erik's voice, distorted by youth and panic. At first his attackers laughed at the frantic four-year-old trying to fight them.

They stopped laughing when he lifted them by their belt buckles and slammed them into the wall.

"Leave him alone," Erik said, now terrifyingly calm, "or I will kill you. In fact, I can't think of a good reason not to just do that."

_Because your brain hasn't developed impulse control yet!_ Charles jammed a finger into his temple, managed to send a burst of _run_ and _forget_ to the young hooligans, who complied with alacrity. "Erik," he croaked, "let them go. Come help me instead."

Erik turned and dashed toward him, the wheelchair following of its own accord, but then just stood staring down at him.

"Charles…" The word was halfway to an anguished keening. "Charles, I didn't mean to hurt you. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

"What…? You didn't do this, Erik."

"No, I did. You're right, Moira didn't do it, I did." Something in Erik's eyes was not entirely present, Charles realized in alarm. Was somewhere other than the here and now.

And only in seeing it again did he realize he had seen it before. On the submarine with Shaw, and on the beach afterward. It was obvious now, with his mind radiating its altered state, but with the helmet blocking that he hadn't understood. Flashback, trigger, post-traumatic stress – he wasn't quite sure of the terminology, but he could see it now, that Erik's reactions had been off as surely as if he'd been drugged or mad.

An anger Charles hadn't entirely realized burned in his stomach dissipated like fog.

"Erik." Charles kept his voice gentle and even, spared a moment to nudge the alarmed parlor owner to stay in his doorway a bit longer. "Erik, love, it's all right. Come here." He heaved himself into an excruciating sitting position, dashed blood from his eyes, and held out a hand to the trembling little boy. "Come here, Erik."

Erik stumbled forward, buried his face in Charles's chest. "Don't make me leave, Charles, please don't tell me to leave."

"I never – Erik, I never wanted you to leave!"

"You looked at me – you said – we couldn't be together, you didn't want—"

Charles closed his eyes, hugging Erik as tightly as he could with one arm devoted to propping himself up. "Oh, Erik. We need to have a long talk, you and I."


	4. Chapter 4

The long talk would not be happening that afternoon. By the time Raven and the appalled ice cream man had helped him clean up and get himself into the car, Erik had cried himself to sleep in the back seat.

He slept all the way home, and slept as Raven carried him inside. She set him on the couch, where he slept through dinner and a rousing game of Twister only inches away from where he lay.

"Is he breathing?" Sean asked at one point, peering awkwardly up from his position with both legs and an arm on red.

"He's all right," Charles said doubtfully, but didn't stop Hank when he lumbered over to check, furry paw hovering over Erik's tiny face.

"He's breathing," Hank said in an odd tone, "but… was his hair this long before?"

Raven got off the Twister mat and looked him over. "These trousers weren't too short this morning."

Erik grumbled and sat up. "Mama? I'm hungry. I'm _really_ hungry."

 

Erik ate the dinner they'd put aside for him in three bites. He ate his share of the muffins they'd made for tomorrow's breakfast, and then everyone else's too. He ate twelve peanut butter sandwiches, nine scrambled eggs, an entire package of saltine crackers, two apples, and an entire gallon of ice cream, straight from the box. And when it was gone, he asked for more.

All the while, his hair grew steadily past his chin, his shoulders, his elbows. Charles felt he could almost watch it grow. His arms and legs weren't far behind, and for a very awkward half hour around three in the morning, his nose was about four times bigger than his face could easily allow.

It might have been funnier if they'd been certain it would end well, or if it hadn't hurt "wie verruckt" (as Erik said over and over) every minute. As it was, only Alex laughed, and Charles glared at him and sent him to bed.

Erik, now long, lean and familiar-looking (though with a startlingly unlined face, under the uncontrollable beard he'd insisted on hacking off every few hours) finally fell asleep again around dawn. Charles sent the others to bed – even Raven, by this point, was too exhausted to argue – but stayed beside the couch himself, one hand light on Erik's chest, just to ensure that he did, in fact, continue breathing.

"You're going to be fine now, Erik," he whispered to the silent room. "You're going to… be yourself again, and…"

_And leave me. Again._ Was it too terrible – surely it was – for him to half-wish Erik a child again, one who loved and trusted him and would stay with him, even if they could never be what Charles had once hoped?

He must have nodded off, though not for long – the sun was still barely over the horizon when he woke to the sensation of fingers closing around his wrist.

"Oh," he said.

"Good morning," Erik said, gaze never wavering from Charles's eyes.

"Please don't leave," Charles blurted. "I should have said that. Then. And I didn't. But I'm saying it now."

"I'm mean and dangerous and I'm going to fight you tooth and nail when we don't agree," Erik said, still with that unwavering gaze. Hungry, Charles realized. Almost pleading. "I'm the reason you're in a wheelchair. Are you sure you want me to stay?"

"Yes. Always."

A smile, tiny and warm and disbelieving, softened Erik's face as he sat up – still holding Charles's wrist, long hair and stubble gilded by the rising sun. "Always, then," he said, and pressed a kiss to Charles's palm.


	5. CODA

Raven didn't stay. But she didn't go back to the Brotherhood, either.

"I don't trust them without Erik there to watch my back," she said, as she and Charles watched her taxi pull up in front of the mansion. "I don't really know where I'll go. Track down Angel, maybe."

"Angel? She's not with the Brotherhood?"

"No, left months ago. Couldn't get along with Emma. Of course, who can?" Raven wrinkled her nose.

"Raven…" Charles took her hands. "No, I'm not going to ask you to stay again," he said quickly, seeing her expression shift. "I just… Are you really all right? About me and Erik, I mean. It's all right not to be, we don't expect you to just…"

"Hand over my boyfriend to my brother without a whimper?" Raven gazed thoughtfully out the window a moment. "I'm not in love with Erik, Charles, I never was. We each had things the other needed… and now we sort of don't anymore. We'll always mean a lot to each other. But it hadn't… been that way between us for a while, not really."

"Well. I can’t say I'm unhappy to hear that." Charles ran a sheepish hand through his hair. "Not least because it means a broken heart won't keep you away. Right?"

"Right." Raven rolled her eyes and chucked his shoulder. "See you around, Charles. Next time I have insomnia I'll drop by and you can read me your thesis."

"I'll look forward to it." He leaned forward and kissed her hairline. "I guess you'd better go, the cabbie's getting impatient."

Just before Raven stepped into the cab, though, now-blonde hair swinging over her shoulder, Charles called "Wait!" and dashed back into the house. He watched Raven's brow wrinkle with confusion when he came back out with Magneto's helmet in his hands.

"Just in case Emma Frost decides to come after you," Charles said.

"Uh-huh. And just in case your new boyfriend starts getting weird ideas again."

Charles grinned and scrubbed at his hair again. "Speaking of which, he's headed this way, so unless you want to go through the goodbye process all over again…"

"Yeah, I'm outta here."

Charles watched the cab wind down the long drive. It had almost disappeared from sight when he felt a brush against his mind, so unfamiliar now that his jaw dropped in surprise.

_Take care of him for me, big brother. See you soon._


End file.
